The 2019 Open Championship was the 148th Open Championship, played 18–21 July at Royal Portrush Golf Club in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It was the second Open Championship at Portrush, which last hosted in 1951, won by Max Faulkner. Royal Portrush saw major alterations in preparation for the tournament, including replacing two of the holes.
Lowry shot 67 in both the first and second rounds to share the lead with J. B. Holmes after 36 holes. He shot a course record (since the 2016 renovation) 63 in the third round to have a four-stroke lead over Tommy Fleetwood going into the final day. After shooting a 72 in challenging conditions on the last day, Lowry was able to convert a four-shot 54-hole lead into major victory, after failing to do the same at the 2016 U.S. Open at Oakmont. Fleetwood finished solo second for the second time in a major, having previously achieved the feat at the 2018 U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills.[2]
Major champions Darren Clarke, Graeme McDowell, and Rory McIlroy competed in a major in their native Northern Ireland for the first time. Clarke was given the honour of the opening tee shot and described the event as a watershed moment for Northern Ireland, as hosting was seen as unrealistic during the years when violence ravaged the province.[3] McIlroy was the pre-tournament favourite but shot an 8-over-par 79 in the first round, which included a quadruple bogey eight on the first hole, a double bogey five on the 16th, and a triple bogey seven on the 18th. Despite shooting a 6-under-par 65 in the second round for a two-over-par total, he missed the cut by a single stroke.[4]
Clarke also missed the cut, and McDowell finished tied-57th.[2]
The 36-hole cut was 143 (+1) and better; 73 advanced to the weekend, but no amateurs, so the Silver Medal was not awarded.[2]
Media
The 2019 Open Championship was televised by the Comcast Group in the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland (both on Sky Sports), and the United States (Golf Channel on its cable service on Thursday and Friday, while on NBC its broadcast service on weekends). It was the fourth year of both channels airing the tournament, but the first since Comcast acquired Sky in late 2018, vertically integrating the two. At the 2019 Players Championship, Comcast integrated the two channels' coverage for the first time since the acquisition, and is expected to feature coverage from both networks' commentators.[citation needed]
Specialists Mackenzie & Ebert oversaw changes to the course in preparation for the 2019 Open. The work began in 2015 and it was the first major changes to the Harry Colt designed links since the 1930s. Changes included:[5]
Removing the 17th and 18th holes. Holes 7 to 16 became holes 9 to 18.
Two new holes (the current 7th and 8th), which were created with land taken from the Valley course.
Reshaping some of the greens.
Nine holes had new tees, there were several new bunkers, and the course was lengthened by 201 yards.
The Open Championship field was made up of 156 players, who gained entry through various exemption criteria and qualifying tournaments. The criteria included past Open champions, recent major winners, top ranked players in the world rankings and from the leading world tours, and winners and high finishers from various designated tournaments, including the Open Qualifying Series; the winners of designated amateur events, including The Amateur Championship and U.S. Amateur, also gained exemption provided they remain an amateur. Anyone not qualifying via exemption, and had a handicap of 0.4 or lower, could gain entry through regional and final qualifying events.[10]
Criteria and exemptions
Each player is classified according to the first category in which he qualified, but other categories are shown in parentheses.[a][11]
1. The Open Champions aged 60 or under on 21 July 2019
The Open Qualifying Series (OQS) consisted of twelve events from the six major tours and the Korean Tour.[18] Places were available to the leading players (not otherwise exempt) who finished in the top n and ties. In the event of ties, positions went to players ranked highest according to that week's OWGR.
The Final Qualifying events were played on 2 July at four courses covering Scotland and the North-West, Central and South-coast regions of England. Three qualifying places were available at each location, with 72 golfers competing at each.[19]Sam Locke and Ashton Turner were successful at Final Qualifying for the second consecutive year.[20] Brandon Wu was exempt[10] from regional qualifying because he was ranked in the top ten in the World Amateur Golf Ranking,[21] while Tom Thurloway was exempted by winning the 2018 English Amateur closed championship.[22] Other qualifiers were exempted from regional qualifying by virtue of a top 1000 Official World Golf Ranking at the date of entry.[10]
To make up the full field of 156, additional places were allocated in ranking order from the Official World Golf Ranking at the time that these places were made available by the Championship Committee. The first 14 alternates were added using the week 25 rankings on 26 June;[23] two of those declined spots and were replaced by the next two alternates.
From the Week 25 (week ending 23 June) Official World Golf Ranking:
Thursday: Mostly cloudy with intermittent showers. High of 64 °F (18 °C). Winds WSW 10–15 mph (16–24 km/h) with gusts of 20–25 mph (32–40 km/h).
Friday: Mostly cloudy with occasional rain showers. High of 66 °F (19 °C). Winds NNE 5–10 mph (8–16 km/h).
Saturday: Cloudy with periods of sunshine. High of 66 °F (19 °C). Winds WNW 7–10 mph (11–16 km/h) with gusts of 18–22 mph (29–35 km/h).
Sunday: Due to expected inclement weather, final round tee times ran from 7:32 a.m. to 1:47 p.m. Rainy with periods of heavy rain. High of 66 °F (19 °C). Winds SSW 17–20 mph (27–32 km/h) with gusts of 30–35 mph (48–56 km/h).[2]
Round summaries
First round
Thursday, 18 July 2019
Brooks Koepka, winner of four of the last ten majors, shot a three-under 68 and was two strokes off the lead, tied for third with twelve others. Tiger Woods hit his highest first round score in the Open, a seven-over 78. J. B. Holmes opened with 66 for a one-shot lead over early leader Shane Lowry.[24] It was the second time he'd led in a major championship, the other time being the second round of the 2008 PGA Championship at Oakland Hills. Rory McIlroy shot an 8-over-par 79 which included a quadruple bogey eight on the first hole, a double bogey five on the 16th and a triple bogey seven on the 18th.[25] Two weeks after his win at the Dubai Duty Free Irish Open, Jon Rahm finished two shots off the first-round lead.[2]
After round two, Shane Lowry and J. B. Holmes shared the lead on eight under. Brooks Koepka sat at tied-8th, the 12th consecutive major he'd been in the top 20. Four players, Justin Harding (T5), Xander Schauffele (T18), Kevin Streelman (T48) and Rory McIlroy (MC), posted a second round 6-under-par 65, the current course record (since renovation). 73 professionals and no amateurs made the cut line of 143 (+1). McIlroy missed the cut by one stroke, for the first time since 2013.[27]Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson both missed the cut, the first time this had happened in 83 majors. Local resident Graeme McDowell, and defending champion, Francesco Molinari, made the cut on number.[2]
Shane Lowry shot an 8-under-par 63 to break the course record since it was remodeled in 2016. His 197 set a new 54-hole scoring record at the Open, beating the 198 set by Tom Lehman in 1996 at Royal Lytham & St. Annes.[28] He became the 12th player since 2000 to be leading in a major by four or more strokes, with only three of them failing to go on and win, including Lowry himself at the 2016 U.S. Open. Lee Westwood sat tied-6th in his 82nd major start, which is the second highest number of major starts without a victory, with only Jay Haas (87) having more. The light afternoon winds favoured the later starters, and led to lower scores than in the first two days.[2]
Sunday’s tee times were moved forward due to the adverse weather forecast. The first tee time for the final round at Royal Portrush was at 7:32am BST, with the two leaders beginning their final round at 1:47pm.[29][30]Shane Lowry shot a 1-over-par 72, with only Tony Finau scoring lower (71) out of the players in the top 10 after round 3. It meant Lowry won with a six-shot margin ahead Tommy Fleetwood, the highest winning margin in a major since Martin Kaymer in the 2014 U.S. Open. Lowry had a clear lead throughout the round, and was generally praised for his composure in testing weather conditions, with some remarking about the similarity to his 2009 Irish Open win when he still had amateur status.[2]. J.B. Holmes started the day at 10 under par in solo third place, he shot a dismal 16 over 87 to finish tied for 67th at 6 over par.
Lowry was interviewed by host broadcaster, Sky Sports, where he discussed his victory:[31]
"It's like an out-of-body experience! I was so calm coming down the last, I cannot believe it. The weather was awful but I had a look around, and everyone was struggling. It became a two-horse race with Tommy, and I just tried to focus on staying ahead."
"I suppose I talked to my caddie Bo a lot today, I said 'I cannot stop thinking about winning, holding the claret jug'. He just said, 'stay focused', and what a job he did today. I cannot wait to wake up tomorrow and feel what it feels like it is phenomenal."
Media and sporting reaction
Lowry's victory was widely covered in Ireland, and was featured on the front page of newspapers in both the Republic and Northern Ireland.
Before the start of the championship, The R&A made random inspections of players' clubs and found four drivers out of 30 tested did not comply with the characteristic time (CT) test requirements, including that of Xander Schauffele.[35] It was also reported that 15 drivers had failed similar testing in May 2019 at the Diamond Cup Golf event on the Japan Golf Tour.[36]
^Gavin, Brian (22 July 2019). "A different man in black deserves the plaudits". Irish Examiner. It's not often golf takes precedence over Gaelic games for me but this was an exception — and oh what an exception... It's the great sporting story we've had in the town, in the county of Offaly since 1982 when Seamus Darby did what he did to Kerry... I heard the supporters in Croke Park yesterday were given updates on Shane's final round in Portrush on the big screens and he would have really appreciated that.
Shane Lowry
